Author Archives: NewsHound

NewsHound

Kirsty Williams: We go into this election as the smallest opposition party which has delivered more than anyone else

By NewsHound | Sun 10th April 2016 - 9:54 am

Kirsty Williams on Radio WalesKirsty Williams came in for some pretty aggressive questioning from BBC Radio Wales’ Jason Mohammad the other day. He was not interested in giving her any opportunity to explain what she stood for. All he wanted to do was to talk about how badly the Liberal Democrats were doing in all sorts of elections.

She handled it all very coolly, talking about how Brecon and Radnorshire was now lumbered with a Tory MP who was perfectly happy to vote for cuts to tax credits and disability benefits. She talked about what the Liberal Democrats has achieved in the Assembly despite being the smallest opposition group and how we were winning council by-elections again.

You can watch the whole thing here:

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LibLink: Nick Clegg: Hypocritical Brexiteers are as much an elite as those they rage against

By NewsHound | Sat 9th April 2016 - 11:55 am

I reckon that Nick Clegg’s columns will be more often than not about the EU for the next few months.

This week, he’s looking into the records of those “men of the people” Brexiteers such as Boris, Farage, Zac Goldsmith and Nigel Lawson:

Well, there’s Lord Lawson, the 83-year-old former chairman of Vote Leave who was Chancellor of the Exchequer under Margaret Thatcher. He now lives for much of the year in the South of France, nurturing his climate-change scepticism and loathing of the EU from the sunny climes of the Gascon countryside.

Then there’s Nigel Farage, always ready to claim the everyman mantle over a pint of ale in a traditional English pub. Nigel had a long career as a City trader before he became an MEP 17 years ago, and has failed now on seven occasions to become an MP — hardly evidence of someone seeking to shun the Westminster establishment.

How about Arron Banks, the millionaire Conservative donor who defected to Ukip and co-founded the Leave.EU campaign? The insurance magnate was named in the Panama Papers this week as the shareholder of a company based in the British Virgin Islands.

There’s Zac Goldsmith, the Eurosceptic Tory mayoral candidate, who parades himself as a scourge of the Westminster establishment. He is the son of a billionaire whose whole mayoral campaign appears to be based on the claim that his closeness to the powerful in Westminster will help Londoners.

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Miriam Gonzalez Durantez has a right go at Brexiteers over terrorism claims

By NewsHound | Sat 2nd April 2016 - 12:30 pm

Earlier this week, Miriam Gonzalez Durantez took to the pages of the Telegraph to deliver a scathing riposte to those “Leave” campaigners who seek to scare us into believing that being in the EU increases terrorism.

She started with an insight at her feelings over the Coalition years:

Having felt for five full years the frustration of seeing my husband, Nick Clegg, regularly reversing ill-judged Conservative decisions with little public credit, it is tempting to remain silent on the Brexit referendum – yet another ill-judged Conservative government decision that puts at risk the future of all our children just to sort out internal difficulties in the Conservative Party.

She tackles the idea that the EU’s freedom of movement is behind a flood of foreign criminals ending up here. In fact, she places the blame closer to home:

These assertions are made despite the fact that the UK is not part of the Schengen area and that, even for those within Schengen, there are exclusions to the freedom of movement on public security grounds. So if the Home Office has allowed criminals and terrorists into this country, it is nothing to do with EU rules and everything to do with the Home Office itself.

Terrorism, she says, is always the fault of hate-filled individuals, but she cites 3 key foreign policy decisions on Iraq, Syria and Libya as enabling ISIL to expand. Surprisingly, she questions her own role:

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Lamb says Tories failing on mental health waiting times

By NewsHound | Wed 30th March 2016 - 12:15 pm

So, it didn’t take long for the Tories to apply the brakes to all the good work done on mental health by Norman Lamb and, before him, fellow Liberal Democrat Paul Burstow.

The Independent talks exclusively to Norman about what’s happening now he’s not there to drive things forward.

Norman Lamb, who served as the minister responsible for mental health in the Coalition government, said that vital new waiting-times targets for a range of mental health conditions including bipolar disorder and OCD “won’t happen” because the plans were not funded.

He also hit out at an NHS England decision to water down financial incentives for local health authorities to improve mental health services, and criticised “scandalously low” levels of funding for research into mental health conditions.

Mr Lamb, the Liberal Democrats’ health spokesperson and one of the country’s leading campaigners for improved mental health services, said that “all signs” pointed to “a continuing disadvantage for those who suffer from mental illness with no prospect of it ever changing”.

He told the paper:

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LibLink: Paddy Ashdown: Brexit would help those who seek to undermine UK security

By NewsHound | Sun 27th March 2016 - 3:25 pm

Paddy Ashdown has made his voice heard in the row over whether being in the EU helps or hinders national security. It will come as no surprise to anyone that he thinks it helps.

First the broad principle:

My answer is clear. This, more than ever, is the time to stand with our friends in Belgium and across Europe. We must not allow the butchers of ISIS to divide us, and we must give short shrift, too, to those who want to use these attacks to divide our societies. This is no time for division. It is a time to understand why as Europeans we should stand together with our friends in Belgium in their suffering and resist both the racists and extremists of jihad, and the racists and extremists in our midst in their attempts to divide us. Our unity in Europe makes us safer, not weaker. Our solidarity is our best defense. Our pan-European institutions provide us with the means to diminish these threats; they do not, as some foolishly claim, make them worse.

And then the specifies:

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LibLink: Nick Clegg: The five big fat lies being perpetuated by Brexit’s Project Fib

By NewsHound | Sun 27th March 2016 - 12:24 pm

Nick Clegg’s Standard column this week concentrated on the European Referendum, as I suspect many of them will in the next few months. He sought to smash 5 key themes of the Leavers’ rhetoric.

The first is the claim that our membership of the EU costs us £55 million a day, a figure repeatedly used by Farage, Johnson and others. It’s a total con. As the fact-checkers at InFacts have found, in 2015 the net cost was in fact £17 million a day, or around 30p per person. For that entry fee we then get all the benefits that our access to the world’s largest single market brings, which the CBI has estimated to be worth £3,000 to every British household. So every man, woman and child materially benefits many times more than what we pay in.

The second is that, when it comes to trade, the EU needs us more than we need it. At a debate I took part in last week, this was the very first point made by Tory minister Andrea Leadsom. Again, totally bogus. Our exports to the rest of the EU represent around 12 per cent of our GDP but the EU’s exports to us are just three per cent of its GDP. Neither side will want a trade war but we should be under no illusion that the EU would have the much stronger hand to play in any negotiations if we left.

The third is that fewer than 750,000 Brits live elsewhere in Europe, far fewer than the number of EU nationals who live in the UK, a fib that Farage used against me in that same debate. But his figure is complete baloney. The Government’s own estimates a few years ago suggested around 2.2 million British people were living at least part of the year elsewhere, which is only slightly less than the 2.3 million EU citizens estimated to be living in the UK. The right to live and work across the EU is a two-way street.

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Katy Gordon compares Lib Dem & SNP tax plans: “SNP fiddle at margins, Lib Dems choose to make Scotland great again”

By NewsHound | Wed 23rd March 2016 - 2:58 pm

Katy GordonYesterday the SNP revealed their tax plans for Scotland. They were, to be honest, the plans of a Government that’s cosy with being the Establishment, not of an insurgent movement wanting to bring change.  You’d have thought, after all their moaning about the 50p rat being reduced to 45p, that they’d have put it straight back up but, no. Having said that you could argue that we could have done the same thing given that we were forced into it by the Tories in coalition in exchange for the raising of the tax threshold for the lowest paid. However, in our defence, our Scottish plans for a zero rate for the lowest paid will involve tax rises for the richest.

The SNP plans not to raise the higher rate tax threshold – but that’s it. Other than that they will keep tax rates where they are. They wanted powers but when they are given them, they choose to tinker around the edges rather than use them for good. The cuts they have lumped on local authorities make their assertion that they are anti austerity sound hollow.

Over at the Scottish Lib Dems’ website, Katy Gordon, our lead candidate for the West of Scotland,  has given her analysis of the SNP’s proposals compared to ours. 

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Liblink: Clegg warned Osborne that £12bn welfare cuts were wrong

By NewsHound | Tue 22nd March 2016 - 10:43 am

In today’s Times, Nick Clegg relates the warning he gave to Osborne over Tory plans for welfare

Shortly before the election last year, I privately warned George Osborne that his ambition to cut £12 billion from the welfare budget whilst refusing any additional tax rises on the better-off was a strategic error.

Any further savings were bound to hit the working poor — strivers, not shirkers — and the vulnerable and sick. It would confirm the public’s worst suspicions about the Conservatives: they would be seen as the party of the rich.

The full article is behind a paywall, but we …

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LibLink: Lynne Featherstone: The Tories continue to attack the planet

By NewsHound | Wed 16th March 2016 - 6:45 pm

Lynne Featherstone today tries to get the House of Lords to oppose Tory cuts to renewable obligations, which, as she points out in an article for Politics Home, is hardly consistent with the protocol they signed up to in Paris.

I do not have the space to list the full litany of destruction that has been wrought since the election by this government but it includes such worrying measures as privatising the Green Investment Bank, ending support for onshore wind power, weakening the zero carbon homes standard, and reducing the incentives to purchase low-emission cars.

Now to add to that list we have rooftop solar, a cornerstone of the Solar Strategy produced in April 2014. The tariff that has been set for the 1-5MW solar band is much too low to incentivise rooftop deployment in that size range, leaving larger rooftops with essentially no route to market. The large-scale rooftop market is potentially the most significant and cost-effective solar market. This market dominates across Europe and is expected to reach grid parity first, and yet the UK is not taking this market seriously.

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Grace Goodlad and Duncan Borrowman’s new pub in Oswestry is open

By NewsHound | Sat 12th March 2016 - 12:55 pm

Grace Goodlad and Duncan Borrowman have won a whole stack of awards from CAMRA from when they ran the Orpington Liberal Club.

Now they’ve taken on a new challenge and have bought a pub in Oswestry.

The local paper, the Shropshire Star,  covered The Bailey Head’s opening earlier this week. They even have video of the event:

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LibLink: Norman Lamb: Why we should regulate Cannabis

By NewsHound | Tue 8th March 2016 - 7:45 pm

Tim Farron has openly said that he smoked Cannabis as a youngster.

From today’s Mirror:

Lib Dem chief Tim Farron has becomes the first leader of a UK-wide political party to admit smoking cannabis.

The MP’s candid confession comes as he calls for the complete legalisation of the drug in a bid to generate up to £900million for public coffers.

Father-of-four Mr Farron, 46, told the Mirror: “I tried cannabis when I was younger, as did many other politicians.

“But sadly, too many other politicians want to continue forcing our police to waste resources chasing cannabis users when they should be able to take violent crime instead.

“It’s time that we had the courage to look at the evidence and make a decision that will help us to tackle the real criminals instead of the current failed approach.”

On the party website, Norman Lamb has urged members to support the motion calling for the legalisation of Cannabis. He wrote:

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LibLink: Nick Clegg: We’ve made progress on mental health but there’s still work to do

By NewsHound | Thu 3rd March 2016 - 3:55 pm

Nick Clegg has written about mental health in today’s Evening Standard column.

One story illustrates different attitudes to physical and mental health:

A few years ago, I met a man called Robert at a mental health trust in Liverpool. He was in his sixties, well-dressed and with a neatly trimmed moustache that gave him something of the air of a Fifties provincial bank manager — not the image you normally associate with severe mental illness. He told me that a few years earlier he had been in hospital with a heart condition and, while he was there, he had been visited regularly by friends and family, sometimes three or four times a day. This outpouring of love was a great tonic for him as he recovered. But he was hospitalised on another occasion — this time for a mental health condition. During the five months he languished in hospital he was visited just three times. The contrast speaks volumes.

He talks about the work that the Liberal Democrats did government, and goes on to outline 3 new priorities for action:

The first is the way it is funded. Part of the reason that there have been cuts in mental health services despite the renewed focus from government is down to an important, if technical, discrepancy in the way they are paid for. A hospital, for example, is paid by activity: each procedure has a price attached to it and the more it performs the more money it gets. Mental health trusts, on the other hand, usually get a block grant. So when demand goes up, the money stays the same.

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Greg Mulholland wins award from road safety charity

By NewsHound | Wed 2nd March 2016 - 9:15 am

Greg MulhollandLeeds North West MP Greg Mulholland has won the charity Brake’s Parliamentarian of the Year Award for his campaign for justice for victims of criminal driving.

From the Yorkshire Post:

Mr Mulholland said: “I am very honoured to have been named Brake’s Parliamentarian of the Year. For many years now, I have worked with Brake and its fantastic staff, who have been very supportive of my campaign to get better justice for victims and families of criminal driving.

“It has also been a real pleasure to have worked with families and campaigners determined to get that justice. This award represents the work that we have all done together, and no doubt we will continue campaigning until we get the changes that we need to see. Until we get there, I look forward to continuing to work with Brake, so a huge thank you for this award.”

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Kirsty Williams: “Lib Dems have used our influence to get investment in schools and more nurses”

By NewsHound | Thu 25th February 2016 - 5:27 pm

 

Kirsty Williams 2Kirsty Williams came out fighting in a BBC Wales pre-election interview at around 15 minutes in.

The introduction contained a very gloomy forecast from an academic. Kirsty pointed out that they same forecasts had been made about our performance 5 years ago in the early days of the Westminster coalition.

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LibLink: Edward McMillan-Scott: Making the case for Britain as a strong force in Europe

By NewsHound | Thu 25th February 2016 - 10:20 am

Former Lib Dem MEP Edward McMillan-Scott has written for the Yorkshire Post, unsurprisingly on the subject of the forthcoming  EU Referendum.

He compares and contrasts this referendum with the last one in 1975:

Today’s media will play a decisive role in shaping the debate but is far more diverse both in attitudes and structure than in 1975. Then there were a handful of radio and TV channels whereas now there are hundreds; then only the Morning Star and the Spectator opposed Britain remaining in, but now the print media are much more evenly split. The role of social media has exploded in recent years and knows no constraint, political or personal.

Today, largely thanks to the EU, low cost airlines carry Britons routinely to airports which have sprung up in every corner of the continent and its islands. There we have learned new cuisines and cultures.

However, the most fundamental difference in Europe between 1975 and today is the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 and the subsequent enlargement of the EU to embrace its emerging democracies. Our generation has had the happy task of creating the world’s largest Single Market within a democratic framework.

The roles of Nato and the EU in the fall of the Berlin Wall are often discussed, but their close relationship was foreseen in their earliest years. Today, they are stronger not just because they are both located in Brussels, but also because there is a plethora of working arrangements between them, such as a shared 24-hour situation room.

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Reaction to the General Election Review

By NewsHound | Fri 19th February 2016 - 7:40 pm

Welcome to our whistle-stop tour of the coverage of our General Election Review. If you’ve missed our earlier pieces, you can read the document here.

The Mirror has a poll at the end of their piece. 28% of respondents say they’d vote for us in the future. I’ll take that.

The BBC quotes Tim Farron’s response:

The review – carried out by members of the party’s Campaigns and Communications Committee – made a string of recommendations to help the party fare better in any future coalition.

These include that Lib Dems should make it clear they will only automatically vote for legislation covered by the coalition agreement, and that the “wider party” should be represented in the negotiations.

Tim Farron, who replaced Mr Clegg as leader, said: “Blame and criticism can provide short term satisfaction, but do nothing for a future vision.

“This report is about setting a way forward, recognising the mistakes we made, and learning from them.”

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Scottish Lib Dems to oppose jail terms of less than a year

By NewsHound | Sun 14th February 2016 - 1:00 pm

The Scottish Liberal Democrats have announced another major policy. A few weeks go, they announced their penny on income tax to raise £475 million for investment in education.

Today, Justice spokesperson Alison McInnes has announced that the party will oppose prison sentences of less than a year.

From the BBC:

As part of their 2016 election manifesto, the Scottish Liberal Democrats are to formally back doubling that, by extending the presumption to 12 months.

Justice spokeswoman Alison McInnes said prison sentences for more serious offenders should be complemented by “tough” community service programmes.
“One of the main priorities for Scottish Liberal Democrats is having a criminal justice system where if someone breaks the law, they are swiftly brought to justice,” she said. “But we also believe offenders deserve a chance to get back on track and community rehabilitation is a fundamental part of that.

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Farron supports bid for cannabis legalisation in UK

By NewsHound | Fri 12th February 2016 - 2:51 pm

Tim Farron has thrown his support behind a motion calling for the legalisation of Cannabis as the Guardian reports:

Farron is to endorse a motion at spring conference which calls on the party to extend its existing support for the legalisation of cannabis for medicinal use to recreational use.

The motion, to be tabled by the former health minister Norman Lamb, will be debated after the release of the findings of an expert panel appointed by the Lib Dems to examine how a legal market for the use of cannabis would work in the UK. The panel has found that the legal use of cannabis could save the exchequer more than £1bn a year. It could generate between £400m-£900m in tax revenues and could save £200m-£300m in the criminal justice system.

The Lib Dem leader said: “The Liberal Democrats will be releasing a report in due course that lays out the case for a legalised market for sales of cannabis. I personally believe the war on drugs is over. We must move from making this a legal issue to one of health.

“The prime minister used to agree with me on the need for drug reform. It’s time he rediscovered his backbone and made the case again.”

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LibLink: Catherine Bearder: The campaign to keep Britain in Europe must be based on hope not fear

By NewsHound | Fri 12th February 2016 - 8:55 am

Catherine Bearder has written for the New Statesman’s Staggers blog to castigate both sides of the EU Referendum debate for negativity, citing the example of Scotland:

On the one hand, Ukip and the feuding Leave campaigns have shamelessly seized on the events in Cologne at New Year to claim that British women will be at risk if the UK stays in Europe. On the other, David Cameron claims that the refugees he derides as a “bunch of migrants” in Calais will all descend on the other side of the Channel the minute Britain leaves the EU. The British public deserve better than this. Rather than constant mud-slinging and politicising of the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis since the Second World War, we need a frank and honest debate about what is really at stake. Most importantly this should be a positive campaign, one that is fought on hope and not on fear. As we have a seen in Scotland, a referendum won through scare tactics alone risks winning the battle but losing the war.

So what’s the alternative?

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Farron fulfils Leadership campaign promise by submitting bill to end gay blood ban

By NewsHound | Tue 9th February 2016 - 3:52 pm

During his leadership campaign, Tim Farron said that he would submit a Bill to end the ban on gay men giving blood. Today he’s making good on that promise.

From Pink News

Mr Farron told PinkNews: “The current law which bars sexually active gay men is scientifically and socially outdated, deeply and unjustly stigmatising, and urgently needs to change.

“In 2016 I cannot see why we can’t support an evidence based approach.

“I hope my bill today is another stage in the long running campaign to deliver equality.”

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LibLink: Tim Farron: Now the draft plan is on the table, the referendum campaign begins in earnest

By NewsHound | Tue 2nd February 2016 - 4:48 pm

Tim Farron has been writing about the announcement of the draft EU settlement over at the Huffington Post. Well, actually, it’s more about the substantive issues of the referendum. His article is exactly the sort of positive voice the campaign needs, giving five reasons for us to remain in the EU:

1. Prosperity: Remaining in works for Britain. Britain is already stronger and better off trading and working with Europe. We are part of the world’s largest single market, allowing British businesses to grow and prosper.

2. Peace: After decades of brutal conflict, European nations came together in cooperation. To this day, neighbours and allies support each other in what remains the world’s most successful project in peace.

3. Opportunity: British people have more opportunities to work, travel and learn than ever before. Staying in Europe gives our children and grandchildren greater prospects, and the best chance to succeed.

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Farron’s football metaphors: he wants to be like Graeme Souness at Blackburn Rovers

By NewsHound | Sun 31st January 2016 - 11:25 am

When Tim Farron went to Newcastle this week (where he impressed a room full of young people), he spoke to the local paper.

His speeches always used to feature football metaphors somewhere but in recent years, they’ve been less prevalent. However, he had no choice when he was asked which football manager he’d compare himself to. He told the Chronicle that he saw his role as being like Graeme Souness when he was at Blackburn Rovers. The Scottish football manager had a string of successes with that club. Then he left it and went to Newcastle, which wasn’t such a happy experience.

You can see from the video how he answered the question, saying his oft-repeated lines about how there is a space for us in British politics and we are the only opposition to Labour in the north east, which gave him time to think about the best way to actually give the response he was asked for.

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LibLink: Julian Huppert If you’re pro-science, you should be pro EU

By NewsHound | Fri 29th January 2016 - 12:10 pm

There’s not enough Julian in these parts these days, sadly. In May just under 700 votes kept him from continuing as MP for Cambridge and one of the Commons’ few scientific experts. Today, though, he’s written for the Guardian’s Science column, saying that if you are pro-science, you really need to vote to remain in the EU.

Cambridge is massively pro-EU, for many reasons, but he highlights one in particular

The answer I think lies in another special feature of Cambridge: its world leadership in science and technology. We see this in the huge number of Nobel Prizes amassed here, 92 and rising; biomedical success, such as Humira, the Cambridge-developed anti-inflammatory drug that is currently the highest-selling prescription drug in the world; and technology leadership, such as the silicon chips designed by ARM, which now power almost every mobile device in the world. Last year there was as many ARM chips shipped, as there are human arms in the world.

All of this success, from pure research to the most applied technology, from huge global companies to tiny start-ups, benefits from our international connections, and particularly our role in the EU. We get large amounts of funding from the European Research Council – well above our expected share. Overall, about a quarter of the University of Cambridge’s research funding comes from the EU. Our students go on Erasmus exchanges, experiencing life and study elsewhere, and we get many students coming here from around the EU, benefiting from the free movement of people, enriching our cultural, academic and social lives – and spending their money in our city.

It’s not just Cambridge who benefits, though:

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Greg Mulholland wins road safety award

By NewsHound | Thu 28th January 2016 - 10:25 am

Grea Mulholland has won a road safety award for his campaign to get a better deal for families of people killed in car accidents.

He won named Parliamentarian of the Month by the road safety charity Brake.

From the Bradford Telegraph:

Mr Mulholland (Lib Dem, Leeds North West) presented his Criminal Driving (Justice for Victims) Private Members’ Bill in the House of Commons on January 12. It was backed by 31 MPs and will next be heard on March 11.

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Norman Lamb finds increase in mental health patient deaths

By NewsHound | Tue 26th January 2016 - 10:06 am

Using the Freedom of Information Act, Norman Lamb has obtained figures showing an increase in deaths among mental health patients over three years from 1412 to 1713, of these, suicides have risen from 595 to 751.

The Guardian quotes Norman Lamb:

Significant numbers of unexpected deaths at the Mid Staffs NHS trust caused an outcry and these figures should cause the same because they show a dramatic increase in the number of people losing their lives.

NHS England and the government should set up an investigation into the causes of this as these figures involve tragedies for families around the country

…

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LibLink: Tim Farron: Help needed for floods recovery and prevention

By NewsHound | Sun 24th January 2016 - 1:19 pm

Tim Farron has been writing in the Westmorland Gazette about what needs to be done in the short and long term to repair the damage from December’s floods and take action to prevent them in the future.

He talks about the need to repair vital infrastructure quickly:

In the short-term, there is an urgent need to restore damaged infrastructure, while in the longer term we must look at comprehensive, whole-systems approaches to flood prevention. For far too long, the government has sought to make short-term savings at the expense of long-term investment which would have helped to provide protection from the floods.

The single biggest infrastructure challenge we face is the continued closure of the A591. Although the government has finally committed to undertake in full the required repairs, this crucial route connecting the north and south of the Lake District is due to remain closed until the end of May. Local business people expect thatthis could cost the local economy up to £100million. If this happens, businesses that rely on the tourist trade will go under, and with them the jobs they supported. I am urgently pushing for a solution that will provide relief for local businesses.

In the longer term, there’s a need for a holistic approach to tackle flooding:

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LibLink: Nick Clegg: Give doctors the right to prescribe Cannabis for those in real pain

By NewsHound | Sun 24th January 2016 - 8:54 am

Nick Clegg’s Standard column this week tackled the issue of Cannabis prescription:

He tells some real-life stories of people whose lives have been transformed by being able to use Cannabis:

Faye, a corporate PA for a big company who was diagnosed four years ago with rheumatoid arthritis, is about as far away from the cliché of the layabout pothead as you can possibly imagine. An ambitious, outgoing and highly able young woman, the pain threatened to derail the career she had been building since the age of 16. She tried a number of prescription medicines but they came with a range of nasty side effects, from hair loss to constant nausea, that often left her too ill to work.

Four years later, her career is back on track. She makes her own cannabis-based skin cream that she can use at work, which has no psychoactive qualities and can easily be disguised so that no one knows she is using cannabis. To her colleagues, it looks like she simply keeps a small jar of normal hand cream on her desk. As a result, she told me that she can “live my life as I used to four years ago”. But she does so at great expense and at the risk of a criminal record. She is also forced to put herself into potentially difficult situations in order to obtain the cannabis she needs.

Nick makes the point that not one of these people wants to be criminals:

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LibLink: Willie Rennie: Scottish Tories are a referendum themed tribute act, draped in union flag, singing Rule Britannia

By NewsHound | Sat 23rd January 2016 - 11:15 am

Willie Rennie has written a scathing attack on the Scottish Conservatives for the Scotsman newspaper. He accused Ruth Davidson’s party of being nothing but a “referendum themed tribute act.”

In contrast, he set out a strong statement of the values the Liberal Democrats stood for:

I want liberal-minded Yes voters to know they can vote for the Liberal Democrats because Scotland needs strong liberal voices in parliament to stand up for investment in opportunity through education and good health, to guarantee our civil liberties and to protect our environment. We need a strong outward-looking, internationalist, altruistic, tolerant, reformist, pro civil liberties, pro-Europe, pro-environment, pro-business party in Scotland. You don’t get that with anyone else and Yes voters as well as No voters should back us if they want that platform.

The Tories are trying to portray themselves as the true guardians of the union, trying to characterise Labour and Liberal Democrats as flimsy at best because we won’t chuck independence supporters out of our parties.

Willie says that the Tories and the SNP are feeding off each other and trying to continue the independence debate when Scotland’s focus needs to be on its own public services:

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Photo of the week: Alex Cole-Hamilton in a gas mask to highlight air pollution

By NewsHound | Thu 21st January 2016 - 3:45 pm

ACH gas mask

Edinburgh Western and Lothian List candidate Alex Cole-Hamilton took to the most polluted street in Edinburgh this week. St John’s Road in Corstorphine, where he has his campaign office, is the most polluted road in Scotland. It’s one of the main routes from the west into Edinburgh.

Pollution levels in Corstorphine and Queensferry Road are a national disgrace. They represent a clear and present threat to public health, yet the SNP, who have been in charge of this City and this country for nearly a decade, continue to drag their heels.

Almost 2,000 Scots die prematurely each year as a result of vehicle emissions and nowhere is this risk more present than in communities that span the arterial routes into Edinburgh. Investment in my 5 point action plan will actually save our country money in the future in terms of reduced demand on health services and days lost to work through illness.

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NewsHound

Farron slams UK’s billion pound arms deals with Saudi Arabia

By NewsHound | Tue 19th January 2016 - 10:17 pm

The Guardian reports that human rights groups have expressed concern at a major rise in UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

Last month Saferworld and Amnesty commissioned a legal opinion from Professor Philippe Sands QC and other lawyers which concluded that British arms sales to Saudi Arabia, in the context of its military intervention and bombing campaign in Yemen, were breaking national, EU and international law.

UK arms sales in the three-month period from July to September 2015 for the export category that covers missiles, rockets and bombs amounted to £1,066,216,510, the BIS documents show. They were sold under five separate licences.

You can see the official figures showing the details of the export licences here.

Tim Farron has accused David Cameron of putting profits before human rights.

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Posted in News | Tagged , , and | 13 Comments
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